Government unveils national strategy to tackle homelessness in the Czech
Republic

Czech Labour and Social Affairs minister Frantisek Koníček on Tuesday
unveiled the mainstays of a national strategy for preventing and tackling
homelessness in the Czech Republic. The plan involves both effective
prevention and assistance such as social housing, better access to medical
care and improved social services.

František Koníček, photo: CTK
After years of merely responding to crisis situations, the Czech
authorities are finally ready to address the problems of homelessness in a
comprehensive manner. With the number of homeless having reached an
estimated 30 thousand and another 100, 000 people at risk, the government
has outlined a strategy to help them survive and gradually reintegrate in
society.

At a press briefing in Prague on Tuesday, minister Koníček outlined the
main tasks ahead.

“Firstly and most importantly we need to provide social housing. The
fact that the Czech Republic has no social housing is a big problem. So we
need to establish affordable housing as a stepping stone for those who have
already lost their homes and we need to help those at risk of losing them
before it is too late. In this respect we will need more support from local
town halls. We will need better coordinated social services where social
workers will be alerted to individuals or families with social problems and
be able to offer them assistance and advise so that they do not end up on
the street. And finally we need to provide the homeless with access to
medical care before they develop serious chronic health problems or before
it is too late. “

Photo: Honza Ptáček
In addition to the Housing First concept, improved social services and
better access to health care, the strategy emphasizes the need to focus on
prevention, by helping families and individuals in financial straits, even
if it means scrapping their debts and helping them to start anew with a
better fiscal discipline.
Ilya Hradecký, the former head of the NGO Naděje, who has years of
experience of working with the homeless, says Austria’s prevention
strategy has paid off and is an example worth following.

“We know that if you spend a year on the street you need three years of
support to be able to return to a normal life. Social workers in Vienna
have found that it is seven times cheaper to help a person stay in their
home even if it involves scrapping their debts, sponsoring them or giving
them a loan than if that person ends up on the street.”

According to statistics, the people at highest risk of homelessness are
young people just out of institutionalized care, handicapped people, single
mothers and people over 65 or those who have lost their jobs shortly before
reaching retirement age. Pavla Vopeláková of the Czech Salvation Army,
which helped to draft the strategy, has welcomed the strategy as a
milestone in the NGO’s work.

Pavla Vopeláková, photo: Czech Television“Firstly it is important because it is the first national strategy for
dealing with homelessness, there was nothing like it before in the Czech
Republic. What is also very important is that homelessness is described as
a process, that it is not something that happens to people from day-to-day,
but that it is a process and there are many different things leading up to
it. And that it does not just concern the people that we see on the streets
every day but also people who are living in inadequate housing conditions,
hostels or commercial accommodation and who are threatened by homelessness
and may lose the roof over their heads any day.”

Do you feel that this strategy could significantly change your work for
the better?

“We hope so, we do hope so. The national strategy –as it is written
– is brilliant and it has great potential. Now it will be important to
implement the individual steps so that we get to where we want to be. Of
course, it is going to take years and we cannot hope to eradicate
homelessness with it but the steps described can really support this area
and can make a big difference in the Czech Republic.”